April, What a month!

Whew!  What a busy month.  The dumpster was filled and is gone.  I was getting a little concerned that we might not have enough room for everything, but we did.  We emptied out the barns and our huge metal building.  We had a huge family garage sale and a lot of people were blessed with a lot of treasures and some really nice clothes.  We have a lot extra room inside and outside of our home.  :)  I still have a pile of magazines to go through in our reading room.  Laughing, this is hard for me.  When I look through magazines I see recipes I want to keep or ideas and instead of pulling it out at the time, I think I will go back and do it later. Thus, a huge pile!  I've decided I'm not looking at the magazines just going to throw them away and it's really hard for me to do that. But I'm doing it.  :)  I will then be finished with the clean out.  Yeah! 

I got my tomatoes and herbs planted the first of the month and they are coming right along.  As you can see, to the right of the picture is our original garden spot with our raised beds.  They had deteriorated so bad, we pulled everything up and we are going to put in new raised beds this year.  With everything else that's going on, tomatoes and herbs will be all I can handle. I planted the tomatoes in our old chicken pen so they should do great.
  I started a new compost pile.  I tried doing the separate compartments but it was hard to turn and just didn't work for me.  This style is easy - just throw it in, I use grass clippings, dirt, some fertilizer and water.  I had a potato plant growing in the middle of the compost a few days ago.  I can never say enough about how great it is to have a compost pile.  It is truly black gold and you literally see the growth difference in your plants when you use it.  I hadn't had a compost pile in quit a while and I started feeling guilty throwing all the veggie clippings and everything else that is good into the trash.  So, a year ago I started it up again.  This time it is a lot easier for me to handle. 

Our little hummingbirds have returned and I have already refilled the feeders once.  They are so cute and hungry.  This year they are perching on the fence around my herb garden, sitting on my rose bush limbs and really going after the lavender blooms.  Get a feeder if you don't have one, they are a joy to watch.

This is something I'm really excited about. I was called and asked to teach a gardening class at a home for mothers-to-be.  They are just getting there raised beds in.  We are a little behind the gun as far as the planting schedule is concerned but it won't matter.  I think it is going to be fun and I'm looking forward to it. 

This month we also celebrated our 43rd wedding anniversary.  Forty-three years......that's a long time.
I like this quote by Eleanor Roosevelt, Success in marriage depends on being able, when you get over being in love, to really love.  That says it all for me.  We received a wonderful surprise from our children for our anniversary, an Alaskan Cruise.  Wow! Very generous and giving human beings.

The outer is supposed to be a reflection of the inner.  All of the clean out just evolved none of it was planned.  Things have already started to change in our lives.  I'm excited!  In the later part of our lives I'm expecting adventure and fun!

A Beautiful Sunday Morning

I sat and watched the sun come up this morning and everything is so clean, bright green and fresh.  It's Spring! 

It's going to be a beautiful day!

xo

Thomas Jefferson Quotes

I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past.

The care of human life and happiness, and not their destruction, is the first and only object of
good government.

I cannot live without books.

This Day

This bright, New Day......
Complete with 24 hours of opportunities, choices and attitudes.
A perfectly matched set of 1440 minutes.
This unique gift, this one day cannot be exchanged, replaced or refunded.
Handle With Care.
Make the Most of It.
There is only 1 to a customer.


author unknown

Political Parties

There is a story that I read to our sons when we were homeschooling.  It was a wonderful story of a man who lived on a farm but he was revered highly for his knowledge in matters of governing a country.  I'm sorry to say, I can't remember all of the particulars but what was impressive about the story was the fact that after the man help correct the major problems and got the country back on track he went back to his home.  The people of this country wanted to make him king or president but he wanted nothing to do with all that. They offered him all kinds of things but he would have nothing to do with any of it.  He wanted to help the people and he did, then he wanted to return to his life of living in the country.  Someone was telling me that it sounded like George Washington but I don't think it was. I wanted to post this story because, for me, it was very moving and it was an example of how I believe leaders of all countries should be.  Their service should not be for personal gain but for the welfare of their citizens.  I know I saved that book containing that story, but I haven't found it yet.  But as I have been looking thru all of my history books, I sit in awe of what I read.  The very thing the founders feared has happened.

I've watched more news in the last 6 months than I have in the last 20 years.  I have had a very passive attitude because I've thought what can you do, who can go up against that corrupt system and change anything.  But as I listen to our elective officials talk about partisan politics it has become disgusting to me.  It became clear to me that they don't care about the people of this country they are concerned about their political party.  Then when I started going through my history books and reading about the constitution I was pretty amazed.  It would be to the benefit of us all to go buy a history book and start reading about the constitution and what the Framers intended. 

In the Federalist, James Madison argued that the Constitution would control factions.  He defined a faction as a group of citizens that pursues it own selfish interests without thinking of the common welfare.  The Framers believed that factions were dangerous for the republican government, whose purpose is to promote the common welfare.  The Framers thought that political parties, groups of people who join together because they have similar views about government and factions.  If parties became part of the political system, they would fight to promote the interests of their own members.  The Framers feared that the strongest political party would then control the government.  Under such circumstances, the government would not equally protect the rights and interests of all the people.  It would instead promote the interest of the party in power.

Thomas Jefferson (my man) believe in a narrow view of the meaning of the constitution.  He believed in small local government.  Jefferson believed that a broad interpretation of the constitution would give to much power to the national government. 

I would say that is exactly what has happened!  There are no easy solutions.  But there is one commandment that should play in the decision making of our political leaders, "Treat Other People The Way You Want To Be Treated and Life, Liberty and Happiness for mankind." When they are voting on bills they should be asking themselves these  questions.  It's not about your political party but it is about American citizens and what is best for them.